Chuck,
I have an old Miller Dialarc HF Stick/TIG machine which I bought second (or third-or fourth)-hand for about $750. It's AC/DC and has an air-cooled torch, which limits how much heat you can pour in and for how long but it does have HF for start or continuous and water-cooled torch capability. The range is 10-310 amps and, years ago when I used to do a fair amount of welding, I was able to weld razor blades with one like it. I read something recently about using some type of current other than HF to avoid interference with electronic devices but can't elaborate; sorry. Anyway, if you look around locally, you may be able to find an older machine in decent shape at a very reasonable price. It may also have a bunch of the extras (foot control, flow meter, electrodes, torch parts, etc.) for boot.
Rob,
I think you can start your TIG arc on a copper (not
zinc) penny without picking up any contamination on the tungsten. Seems to me I've done that before with machines with no HF start but I can't recall for sure.
Lowell